


Online, Offline

by mercutiglo



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Online Dating, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-19
Updated: 2018-11-20
Packaged: 2019-08-25 20:28:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16667773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercutiglo/pseuds/mercutiglo
Summary: Rita is tired of being single and creates an online dating profile.





	1. Chapter 1

Rita had seen the various advertisements for different online dating sites and apps, and was determined that she wouldn't make an account. Except slowly but surely, she was the only one around her that was still not in a relationship - Mistah Steel had Mistah Nureyev even if he wasn't always around, Franny was talking to some girl, and any other friends or acquaintances either were already in relationships or didn't stick around in Rita's life long enough for it to matter. Franny said it sort of nonchalantly one time when they were on the phone, like "maybe you should give it a shot," and Rita had to take some time to realize she said it not because she didn't think that Rita could find someone, but because she just wanted to help make Rita happier faster. So she went on and downloaded the app 'Minter' while she was bored in the office one day, but then she got stuck. They were asking her a series of questions, which was no big deal by itself, she could talk about herself as long as someone was willing to listen. The problem was that she was only given a certain amount of space to do so, and there were too many parts of her personality that she didn't want to try and mash down into one overly-simplified version of herself. The one that was truly stumping her was the question of "How would you (or someone close to you) describe you in three words?" and neither she nor Franny could figure out a good way to describe her multi-faceted personality into so few words. 

So she went into Juno's office to see if he might be able to help her.

"Hey boss, do you got a quick minute to answer a question for me?" Juno was in the middle of very intensely staring at his computer screen, trying to analyze a few photos that he had been sent from the seen of one of his cases, and he was very glad for a distraction for a moment from the screen he had been pouring over for the past two hours. 

"Yes, Rita. Please, distract me for like, five minutes while I rest my brain from these damn photos. What question do you have for me?"

She looked down at her comms in her hands, reassuring herself that she had the question right. "If you were to describe me in three words - only three - what would those three words be?" 

Juno looked at her, his face changing from confusion to concern. "That depends, why? You're not applying for other jobs to leave me, are you?" 

"No no no boss, never! Or at least not until you end up leaving me in the dust one of these days. No, I'm...." She hesitated. She wasn't sure if Juno was going to judge her or not, but she figured that she was terrible enough at keeping secrets, there's no point in trying to start now. "Well I'm makin an online dating profile, and one of the questions is how I would describe myself in three words or how someone close to me would describe me in three words and well Franny hasn't been responding to my messages yet and I figured that since you're here you're as good a person as any to ask." 

Juno leaned back a bit in his chair, thinking. After a minute of this it became visibly clear how antsy Rita was getting by how much thinking he had to be doing, and she started pacing. "Rita, I have another question first. Why are you making an online dating profile? Why do you need one?" 

Rita's expression turned to that of a frown as she slumped into the chair on the other side of Juno's desk. "Because I'm tired of bein lonely, boss. Everyone I know seems to be in some kind of cute and happy relationship and I've got no one. And you already know that even though I like to talk a lot, and so it seems like I'd be the kind of person who would be able to just go out somewhere and find someone, it's a lot harder to meet people in person than online. Or at least I think it is, I'm not really sure. But basically I just want to be happy in a cute relationship and I've reached the point of a little bit desperate and so I'm making a dating profile. And before you say "well were'nt ya gonna go out with my buddy Mick" I did, a couple times, but honestly he's such a disorganized mess, Mistah Steel like I see where you get it from if the two of you were childhood friends. And Franny's in a relationship with some cute girl and so she's got her and I've just sorta got no one, Mistah Steel." 

Juno's face softened. "Rita, you know-

"Yeah boss, I know I know. It doesn't matter if I'm in a relationship or not, I'm still my own good person, blah blah blah, everything my mother tells me every time she asks me if I'm in a relationship and I say no. That doesn't mean I can't want a relationship though."

Juno sighed. "You're right Rita, it doesn't mean you cant want one. Sweet, caring, thoughtful. So, what are the other questions?"

Rita perked up a bit, but she wasn't entirely sure she had heard him right. "What?"

"I'm tired of looking at pictures of a crime scene and I figure if you're having problems fitting all of you into fewer words than are necessary to describe the abundance of personality that you have, then I'll help you figure out what the right words are. And for that question, what are three words I would use to describe you, I would say sweet, caring, and thoughtful. What are the other questions that you still have to fill out?" 

Rita was super excited that Juno was willing to help her out with the rest of the questions. They sat in his office, reviewing her words carefully for the next hour, rewording and rephrasing things so that they were able to show the majority of Rita's personality even though it was an extremely hard task to complete. When they finished the profile, they double and triple checked that she had everything she wanted on there, had the right photos in the right order, and right before Rita pressed the button to publish the profile, Juno made her stop. 

"Now Rita, you gotta promise me something."

"What is it, boss?"

"You have to promise that no matter what the people on there may or may not say, you're not gonna let it all get to you. Remember that you are an excellent person, and I enjoy being able to see you, even if you do get on my nerves on a semi-regular basis. And if you don't get any messages right away, that's okay, sometimes it takes a little bit of time because something websites something you already understand."

"Algorithms."

"All the rhythms yes. And if you go on any dates based on this app, make sure -"

"Yeah yeah yeah, make sure I run a full scale background check, move to multiple locations so that it's harder for him to kidnap me, make sure I pick the place where we get food so he doesn't poison me, if he looks like Cecil Kanagawa call you immediately, don't mention that I work for you, blah blah blah. I know, mom."

Juno just looked at Rita for a moment, taking in all the things that she had just said. "I was gonna say just make sure you have fun, Rita. Although, did your mom really tell you all that stuff?"

She rolled her eyes at him, and took in a big breath, and then pushed the button, adding herself into the network of other people who were just looking for some way to be a little less lonely. "Alrighty, now to turn my comms off completely and get back to work. So what're you lookin for in those photos boss, the smashed TV screen?"

Juno turned back towards where the computer on his desk sat, still displaying the images. And sure enough, when he looked closer, he could see cracks in the upper right hand corner of the television screen in this scene, showing some sort of violence from some time. "Maybe, yeah, why don't you come over here and look at some of these other photos...."

Rita helped Juno with figuring out the rest of the photos, putting together a pretty comprehensive story that involved a baseball bat, two bottles of ketchup, and a whole lot of cocaine. When Juno was about to leave to go talk to the client, Rita had returned to her desk and was on her comms, he made sure he stopped at Rita's desk on the way out of his office. "So, have you gotten any yet?"

"Any what?"

"Any matches or points or whatever it is on these apps these days?"

"These days? Mistah Steel are you saying that you, Mistah "Rita how do I check my email the screen isn't on" actually used an online dating app at one point in your life?"

"Maybe, but that's not the question."

Rita frowned down at her comms. "I've gotten a couple of matches, but I'm a little scared of coming off too strong in my messages, so I haven't messaged anyone yet. How do I make sure I don't come off too strong?"

Juno reached across her desk, putting his hand on her shoulder. "Rita, I'm sure that no matter what you say, it'll be great. Just remember, now there's no limit to all the things you can say, so you can show off as much of your real personality as you want. Also, you're good to go for the day, I probably won't be done until late, so I'll see you tomorrow. Just remember to be yourself and what happens happens." He gave Rita as sincere of a smile as he could muster, and then left the office. Rita sat at her desk for a little while longer, trying to come up with the right words to say, but ultimately not saying anything before she shut off the lights in the office and locked the door to go home.

\----

Juno ended up dealing with the client fairly quickly, and called the HCPD to make sure that they could be on the lookout for the partner who had ended up doing all the damage, and within an hour had received confirmation that he was in their custody. That meant that he was able to go home significantly earlier than he had expected, and in a relatively good mood as well. When he got home, Peter was reading something on the couch in the living room, his glasses down towards the point of his nose, and when he looked up towards Juno he could have sworn that Peter looked about 85 years old, which just made Juno start laughing.

Once Juno started laughing, Peter immediately shut his book and went over to where Juno was still standing, making sure that he wasn't hurt or anything, considering the rarity with which Juno Steel's laughter ever truly came out. "Peter I'm fine, I'm fine, you just looked like a grandma for a second there." Peter immediately stopped trying to make sure Juno was okay, his expression dropping into one of annoyance. "Wait no, come back," he said, chasing Peter onto the couch. "Peter I have a question."

"Goodness, you come home and start laughing and then have a question for me, the apocalypse must truly be here." They both laughed. "What is it, Juno?"

Juno thought for a moment, trying to figure out the right words to say. "How can I help make Rita feel less lonely? I directed her towards my only single friend, and he didn't even work out."

Peter looked at him askance. "Why is this coming up all of a sudden? 

"So, today Rita came into my office asking me for three words to describe her. I asked her why, because the words that I would use vary vastly depending on the context, and she said she was creating an online dating profile. I'm not judging her, I want to make that clear. But so when I asked her why she wanted one, she said she was tired of being lonely and she felt as though the people around her were all in relationships and she just wanted to be rid of that feeling. So, I'm trying to think of a way to make her feel less lonely, like I actually do care about her. I'm just bad at that."

Peter looked away, thinking. When he finally came up with an idea, his eyes lit up, and a small smile came over his face. "Juno, be a dear and hand me your comms...."


	2. Chapter 2

  
The next day when Rita came into the office, Juno was already there, a client having called his personal comms about a file they had sent him, which meant that he had to open it on the work computer since he didn't have the necessary anti-virus protection on his comms that Rita insisted he needed after he opened one too many client files and the whole thing just shut down. And he noticed immediately that she seemed even more bright and cheerful than she usually did, which was fairly impressive considering her usual bounce and attitude. She opened the door to his office and Juno was immediately taken aback by just how much positive energy she was radiating. "Gooooooood mornin, Mistah Steel!" She had even stopped for coffee for the both of them, one of which she promptly handed to him, even though in his head he was thinking that if she's already in this good of a mood she doesn't necessarily need caffeine to add on to the energy.   
  
"Good morning, Rita. You seem....Cheerful."   
  
"I am, Mistah Steel! I'm very excited, so last night I was brushing my teeth and then my comms beeped and I'm like 'Oh I don't know that noise I wonder what that could be?' and then when I looked at it I saw someone had messaged me! I'm so excited! So I stayed up maybe a little too late talkin with him but he seems so so nice, Mistah Steel!"   
  
Juno was surprised, but at the same time, he wasn't surprised at all. She was extremely charismatic, and a fun person to talk to when you aren't Juno Steel all the time, so he wasn't entirely surprised. "What's his name?"   
  
"His name is - get this it doesn't even sound like a real name but I assure you, it is a real name - Pluto Silver."   
  
Juno immediately knew what was happening, but kept his feelings hidden, his expression unchanging. "That's great, Rita! Not to detract from that, but, could you take a look at these files real quick? My client has been messaging and calling me all morning about them and I just can't put it together right now, and also I need to call Peter really quick to ask him something about this as well, is that okay?"   
  
"Yeah sure thing, Boss! But what am I lookin for in these?"   
  
"You know Rita, I'm not really sure, I have not gotten an answer to that question myself in the past hour. Something about 'It's so obvious he's having an affair' but I really don't see anything. I'll be right back."   
  
Juno stepped out into the hall with his comms and he went through all of the apps on his phone (which, granted, weren't very many) until he got to the most recent one, hidden in a folder with some other pointless apps. He saw the name of it and swore before ringing up Peter.   
  
"Yes, Juno dear?"   
  
"Peter why did you do this? Is this why you didn't get to sleep until late last night?"   
  
"Did you like the name?"   
  
"It's a little flashy even for you. Why would you do this to her?"   
  
"Well Juno, you asked how to make her feel less lonely. So I came up with a solution to make her feel less lonely. You should've known she'd go for the sort of mystery man vibe. I even tried to send messages with a speech pattern even you could imitate, since it is on your comms."   
  
"What happens when she finds out?"   
  
"It's a dating app, Juno. You can make it so she never has to find out, you just have to be careful. Not even you can mess that up, I'm hoping at least." Juno's comms buzzed against his ear, showing a new message. "You're not calling me from the office, are you?"   
  
"No, I'm in the hallway outside the office, I told her to look at some files that a client has been pestering me about all morning."   
  
"So just message her back before you go back into the office! It's plain and simple. I believe in you, Juno. I've got to go, but you can do it. Talk to you later," and he hung up before Juno could get in any last words.   
  
Juno looked at the home screen of his comms, debating whether or not he should actually partake in this. He could just let Peter do it once he gets home, but it might come off as a little too suspicious to Rita if Juno ever gets home from work really late, and also he knows that Rita is just clingy enough to freak out about it if she doesn't recieve any messages during the day. He opened the Minter app and looked at the message Rita had just sent.   
  
"Good morning, Pluto! : ) Hope I didn't keep you up too late talking last night, the boss stepped out of the office for just a minute so I figured I could send you a quick message <3"   
  
Juno looked through the window to the office, where he could see the vague outline of Rita sitting at his desk through the more opaque windows to his office, but couldn't see exactly whether she was looking at his computer or completely ignoring the task he had asked of her, simply sitting on her comms waiting for a reply. Juno looked back at the numerous messages that Peter and Rita had exchanged last night after Juno had gone to bed, and formulated a reply.   
  
"Good morning Rita. Didn't keep me up too late, don't worry. Happy to see a message from you in the morning!"   
  
He wasn't sure it 100% fit the patterns of the messages that Peter was sending the night before, but he would have more time to work on it later, and could chalk it up to just being tired in the morning at work or something if she noticed. Rita was also calling for him, so he made sure to close out of the app before he went back in to his office. He heard her comms ping, but tried to ignore it as best he could. "What's the problem, Rita?"   
  
She was busy looking at her comms, looking at the message she had just received. "I'm sorry, what? Oh yeah." She didn't respond to the message she had just received yet, which gave Juno a quick moment to flip his comms onto silent mode (something Rita had shown him how to do at one point because he hated when his comms would go off on important cases in the middle of a silent room). "So I was lookin at these files and noticed in these bank account ones that there's a whole lot of extra expenses and...." Rita went through pointing out the various things that she saw, some of which Juno had seen for himself, some of which she saw from an outside perspective. He had his comms in his hands, taking notes on what she was saying, and eventually when she was done listing the different things she noticed and turned around, she was astounded to actually see the one and only Juno Steel actually using his comms to send messages, a sight she never thought she'd actually see. "Mistah Steel are you.... Using your comms correctly?"   
  
Juno looked up with a tired look in his eyes. "I'm not completely incompetent when it comes to technology, Rita."   
  
"Did you have Mistah Peter show you how to send messages last night so you wouldn't have to ask me how anymore?"   
  
Juno froze. "What?"   
  
"Well you get all fed up every time you have to ask me to help you send a message, so I just figured you got tired of me tryin to help you and so you just had Mistah Peter show you how to send a message, since he's probably better at explainin things to you anyways."   
  
Juno laughed an awkward laugh, and Rita noticed that it was not normal. "Oooh, that's what you meant, okay."   
  
"What else do you think I would have meant, boss?"   
  
"I dunno Rita, I dunno."   
  
"I will say though, I did get a message from Mistah Silver while you were out in the hall talkin on your comms, so I'd say that's a good thing. Unless he doesn't have a job and that's why he's messaging in the middle of the day. Or because his boss doesn't care. Do you think he's got a job, boss?"   
  
Juno sighed, shaking his head and raising his shoulders. "I don't know, Rita. You're the one talking to him, not me. I'm sure no matter what he's a fine person. What all do you even know about him?"   
  
"Well, I know that he seems very mysterious. And yes mom, I know, that should probably send up red flag but Mistah Steel you know me! I work with you, of course I love some mystery! Would I really be me if I didn't? And so I haven't found out a lot about him, but he said he does something to do with finding out the things people don't want other people to know, so I think he's a spy. And I felt kinda bad about keeping him up last night messaging him, but he said not to worry about it. What do guy-type people mean when they say that? Cause I know with girl-type people and neither/both-type people a lot of the time that means that it's something that's a serious issue and you should most definitely worry about it, so I don't know if he's being serious when he says don't worry about it or what?"   
  
"He probably means it Rita, you probably don't have to worry about it." Juno looked down at where he was receiving multiple messages from his client after sending them all the information that Rita had helped him point out, and the phone on Rita's desk was ringing. "Rita I gotta go meet this client, can you grab that call? I should be back in an hour it sounds like, so no need to write off the whole day." He practically ran out of the office, the messages from his client becoming ever more insistent.   
  
\----   
  
Rita knew that the Pluto Silver guy seemed interesting, and had to have some kind of backstory, so since Mistah Steel was going to be out of the office for at least a little bit, she figured she would take the time to message him some more once she got off the phone with what would likely be one of Juno's new clients as long as he took the case, even though it might mean having to travel a bit.   
  
"So, Pluto, do you have any siblings? Any pets?"   
  
A few minutes passed, but then she got a response.

  
"No siblings, but I have a cat named Peter. You?"

  
"I have a sister, but we don't really talk much. I really want a cat, but my landlord won't let me have one, so I'm just waiting until I can move out of there to get one. What do you like to do for fun?"

  
She wasn't sure if she was asking too many questions when it took him almost ten minutes to respond, but she figured that if he was at work, he was probably busy with actual work things anyways.

  
"Sorry my responses are a bit slow, I'm meeting with some people at work right now. I like watching movies and hanging out with my cat the most, but sometimes hang out with other friends. How about you?"

  
She took a minute to think about the way she wanted to respond to this one. She didn't want to seem too overbearing or too boring.

  
"I like to watch tv shows more often than movies, but I really enjoy working on computers, not just like in the sense of doing work on the internet but actually taking apart the different pieces of the monitors and stuff to see how they work and also to see if I can put them back together in a better way. I work for a detective, and I'm hoping some day he'll need me to diffuse a bomb or something, so it's kind of like practicing for that, except it's only a computer."

  
There was a bit of a break in there and then she realized that she didn't ask him a question again, but she determined that she would wait and see. Even though she knew she liked to talk a lot, she figured it was best to see how he might respond, instead of letting him rely on her the entire time to drive the conversation. After about twenty minutes he did respond though.

  
"Wow that's. Super cool and really intense. Have you ever done anything super dangerous like that before?"

  
She was beaming, she loved making it sound like she actually did a lot of detective work herself, even though almost all of the time she was tethered here to her desk.   
  
"Oh you know, only a couple of times. But there was one time, one of my boss's friends got possessed by this robot thing and then tried to attack us and we were up on a balcony at this guy's apartment and he had like a glass door out to the balcony and he threw some chairs through it at us it was a very intense time. My boss had me hack into the robot that was possessing him and shut it down, which almost killed him but really he just spent the next month or so in pain but I mean, he had tried to kill us, what else were we supposed to do? Also there was one time where he told me to watch this vase and then it accidentally fell off of my desk and it ended up being good that it smashed because of all the little pieces or something (I dont remember I didn't really pay attention in Martian History in school) and that felt very very cool."

  
She realized just how long the message was immediately after she sent it, and started to panic. What if he got scared off by how much she talked? What if she made it sound not cool? What if he thought she was exaggerating even though she didn't even exaggerate that much about all of it this time? When he finally responded it was very short.

  
"That sounds really cool actually. Also sorry, just got out of the meeting but have to get back to my office about some other important stuff that needs to be done today. Just in case the rest of the messages are extra slow."

  
Rita quickly typed a response. "Don't worry about it! My boss will probably be back soon as well, so I'll have to cut back because otherwise he'll be pissy about how much I'm on my comms."

  
Juno came back into the office just as Rita was putting down her comms, taking a quick look at his while he went towards his office. "You were right about most of the things, Rita, good job, there's just a couple things left to put together now."   
  
"That's good to know boss. Also, that call that I got just as you were leavin? I think this is a case you'll really wanna take, as long as you get this other case handled in the next three days."   
  
Juno was in his office. "What do you mean? Come in here, I gotta write something down but am interested in literally any case other than the one that I am currently working on at this moment."   
  
She went into his office. "Bunch of stolen stuff in the Museum of Martian History in Olympus Mons. I was thinkin that you'd probably want to try and take Mistah Peter with you? It'd be a couple days though, that's why I'm sayin that you might want to get this one settled first."   
  
"Oh my goodness Rita that's excellent, I'll definitely do it, let me just...." He looked down at his comms again, typing something faster than Rita thought Juno was really able to. While he was typing she got a message on her own comms, and took a moment to look at it.   
  
"What other kinds of detective stuff does your boss do?"   
  
Rita frowned at her phone. She didn't want to talk about Mistah Steel, she wanted to talk more about herself. She looked back up enough to see that he was still sending messages on his own comms, probably to the pushy clients that he had just been meeting with and to Peter telling him that they were going to be traveling, and took a moment to respond.   
  
"Oh you know, stolen stuff, someone thinks their partner is cheating and wants him to find the evidence and figure out it they really are cheating, one time he had to look for a missing cat that ended up being a bomb. Usual detectivey type stuff. I don't remember, did I ask what you do for work?"   
  
Now she could find out if he actually had a job or not. He responded pretty quickly this time.   
  
"Ha ha, you did, but I wasn't very specific. I do a lot of detective type work myself, but I spend more time in an office dealing with paperwork than out in the actual city, fighting bad guys and solving crimes."   
  
She smiled at the message, but looked up when she heard Juno say "Alright screw that I'm done there."   
  
"Boss?"   
  
He stood up from his desk. "Give me the number for the contact at the museum, Peter and I are going to to Olympus Mons tonight, I'm so sick and tired of these other people. If you get an angry call from them, tell them I'm sorry but I'm out of town on another case, and they are free to either wait for me to return to Hyperion City, or they can hire a different PI, I honestly don't care at this point."   
  
"Okay Boss. Do you need me to come in the next couple days til you get back?"   
  
"Yeah, just to check the phone if that's okay with you. I'll let you know if I'm dead, otherwise I should be back within a week." Juno picked up all the different paperwork that was strewn across his desk and threw it all in a drawer of his desk that was also filled with haphazardly sorted papers. "See ya later, Rita. Message me if there are any updates about this case, and keep an ear out in case I need some patented Rita Help. But you know how comms service gets over there, so I might not be able to contact you while I'm gone, so don't worry about me, okay?"   
  
"You know that's never really reassuring when you say that, boss."   
  
"Yeah, I know. But don't worry about it." 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reviews for this chapter include "GLORY IS CANCELLED NO LONGER ALLOWED TOO MEAN FUCKIN DEAD TO ME" and "I'M GONNA STEAL YOUR NOSE" and my favorite:
> 
> that's not okay!!!!  
> hhhhhh  
> aaaahhhhhhhhhh  
> what the Fuckkkkkkkk  
> glprrryyyyyyyyy  
> what the FUCK
> 
> (Thanks Jacqueline for the lovely reactions to reading this chapter, I love you too even if you're the president of the glory hate club)

Rita had been on her own for three days and it just so happened that it had been three days since Pluto Silver had messaged her back as well. She would've asked Mistah Steel if he had any advice, if she was comin off too strong, or what might have made him stop messaging her, but both he and Mistah Peter were still gone and he hadn't been lying about the comms service in Olympus Mons.   
  
So she decided to call up Franny and see if she could get any advice from her.   
  
"Rita!!!!! Oh my goodness I'm so excited to hear from you!!!! How's using Minter going????"   
  
"Franny I missed you so much!! Minter is going pretty okay, but that's actually why I'm calling."   
  
"Oh no really? What's wrong? Did someone break your heart? Do I need to kill someone? Did you get taken on a blind date by a creepy old man? Did you get catfished by someone you know? Did you actually get messaged by a real life celebrity?!"   
  
"Um, no no no no and no. No so okay here's what happened. So I matched with this guy named Pluto Silver and -"   
  
"Rita honey that doesn't even sound like a real name."   
  
"I know it doesn't but trust me, I know it's gotta be his real name. Who would willingly go by a name that ridiculous?"   
  
"Okay that's a fair point. Continue."   
  
"So his name is Pluto Silver and he started messaging me! He's the only person who's really messaged me so far so I'm trying not to let that get to me but that's not the point."   
  
"He's not the only person you've matched with though, right?"   
  
"Oh no! I've matched with a few people he's just the only one I've actually been talking to!"   
  
"Okay good I was gonna say, if he's the only one that's matched with you then I have a problem with the people that are using Minter nowadays wow."   
  
"Okay but so I was talkin to him right? And it was all goin real nice and swell. Well, all of a sudden he just seemed to stop talking to me."   
  
"Well why'd he do that? Did he give you any kind of explanation?"   
  
"Well no not really! So I'm wondering like maybe since he said he does the same kind of work that Mistah Steel does, maybe he went out of town and either forgot his comms or doesn't have service or something?"   
  
"You're smart, can't you track the chip in the comms that he was messaging you from?"   
  
"Oh my goodness, Franny, you're a genius! Of course I can track that, that's easy peasy!" Rita set her comms down next to where she was sitting on the couch while she went to grab her laptop, which was easier to track things on than her comms. "Alrighty so we just have to open up this website...... Make sure that the connection is extra secure....... Fight off a couple of viruses....... Alrighty, now, just to put in the app...... And the user code...... And viola it's loading and it shows that Pluto is...." Rita trailed off.   
  
"Well, where is he?" Rita didn't say anything as she refreshed the page and put in all the information again. All Franny could hear was furious typing noises. "Rita? Did you find out where he is?"   
  
"Franny I got a question for ya."   
  
"Rita, did you find out?"   
  
"Do you think Mistah Steel would lie to me about something? I know you've never met him, but based off the things I've told you about him, do you think he'd be the type of person who would lie to me?"   
  
Franny was silent for a moment, clearly puzzled by the sudden change in topic. "I mean, it's a possibility there Rita but I don't understand, what does that have to do with Mistah Steel?"   
  
"Franny, the location on this comms says that right now it is at the Museum of Martian History in Olympus Mons. Which is precisely where Mistah Steel and Mistah Peter are right now. Also, this Pluto guy said that he does work very similar to Mistah Steel, so it's either Mistah Steel himself or it's Mistah Peter, and if you wanna know what I think I think it might've been both of them, because the first night I talked to Pluto he sounded very different than when I talked to him during the work day, and he had been forgetting what questions we had already talked about." Rita was only barely keeping herself from crying into her comms, the reality starting to set over her. "Do you think Mistah Steel did this so that I would feel better and actually have someone to talk to?"   
  
Franny sighed into her comms. "I don't really know Rita. When did Mistah Steel get to Olympus Mons?"   
  
"Three days ago, after work."   
  
"When did you stop getting messages from this Pluto fella?"   
  
"Three days ago. After work."   
  
"Rita darlin I wish I was there so I could give you a big ol hug. Because what it sounds like to me is that maybe Mistah Steel is the one behind Pluto Silver. Although that doesn't really make sense, because you would think a private eye would be better at coming up with a fake name, especially with that fella Mistah Whatshisname always comin up with new names and things like that."    
  
The tears were starting to fall into Rita's lap and she could feel her throat closing up with all of the emotions running through her. "You know what Franny, you're right. I do think he should be better at fake names. I think I'm gonna have to call you back though, one of my shows is coming on."   
  
"Rita what're you talking about, none of your shows come on for another-" Rita ended the call. She threw her comms away from her, into the chair on the other side of her living room. She didn't want to accept it, but at this point it was the only thing that really made sense. Why had her boss done that too her? What would make him do something so mean? Did he not think she would find out? Did he really not think she would get any messages from people? If he thought she was so wonderful then why would he do something so mean to her? She pushed her computer away as well, and curled up in a ball on the couch. She was going to have to have a talk with her boss as soon as he got back.

 

\----

  
It was another three days til he got back though, and when he did he looked like he had been through hell. He'd managed to get to the bottom of the case though, solving it and returning the lost items to the museum. Nothing had really come in on the office phone besides over a hundred incessant calls from the clients that were being unnecessarily pushy, which meant that by day two Rita had answered one of their calls and more or less told them that she was going to be blocking their number forever if they didn't stop calling, and that she could contact a network of PIs across Mars to tell them not to do business with them if they continued to be rude, and the calls magically stopped coming until Juno got back.    
  
Juno had beaten Rita into the office the day he got back, likely because he had simply slept there so that he could make sure he actually came into work that day. When Rita came in, he noticed that there was something wrong, a frown on her face, a sour mood in the air, and debated whether or not to say anything. Eventually he realized that she looked about ready to cry, and asked her to come into his office. "Rita, you look like shit, what's wrong? Didn't you take the past week off? I thought you would've gone on a little vacation or something, spent some time for yourself, gone and done.... I don't know, gone to the spa or something? What's wrong?" Rita sat in the chair across from him, not saying anything, arms crossed and a frown across her face, barely holding back the tears in her eyes. "Rita you look like you're about to cry, what is wrong? Did that Pluto guy stop talking to you?"   
  
Rita lit up with anger so quickly it caused Juno to flinch backwards as she sat up in the chair, tears freely starting to stream now. "Really, Mistah Steel? You're gonna bring that up and act like you have nothing to do with it? Why would you even do something like that Mistah Steel I mean honestly. Did you think no one was going to talk to me? Did you think that no one else would actually care enough about me, and you wanted to make sure you protected me from the big bad database of random chance?"    
  
Juno shrank in his chair, pain crossing his face. He didn't think it would last forever, but he also didn't think that she would find out quite so quickly. "Rita, it wasn't-"   
  
"What, it wasn't your idea? No, I didn't figure so, but you know what you could have let it end when Mistah Peter went to bed, even though it was on your comms. And you're probably wondering how I figured it out so fast. Everyone kept saying it sounded like such a fake name, and I was just trying to tell myself that it wasn't really that fake, like it was such a bad name that how could anyone ever willingly go by that name? But after three days with no response once you got to Olympus Mons, I called Franny, to talk about what I might've done wrong. And you know what she said? 'You're smart, why don't you just track the comms' and thank goodness Franny told me to do that because at least then I was able to find out the truth before I got actually emotionally invested!" Her makeup was running down her face, which only made Juno feel worse. She had to stop talking because she started hiccuping, her sobs coming across loud and clear in the small office.    
  
He got up from his desk and went around it to Rita. She had stood up during her yelling, leaning over his desk, and now was sitting on the floor, leaning up against it while she cried. He too slid down the edge of his desk so that he was sitting next to her, and wrapped his arms around her. She tried halfheartedly to push his arms away, not really wanting a hug from him right at the time considering how upset she was with him, but it didn't really work considering she was just so tired of all of the things falling down around her that she just had no real energy behind it. "Rita, I want you to know something. I know you wanna argue, but just, let me explain something to you. I felt bad about the fact that you felt so lonely. I hadn't realized you were feeling that way until you walked into my office to ask me for those three words, and after that I felt bad, I felt like I was being a shitty boss but more importantly, I felt like I was being a shitty friend. So what I did was I asked Peter if he could think of any way for me to make you feel less shitty and lonely, and then he took my comms and created the account and made the messages and everything. I had fallen asleep and he was hiding my phone from me while he was making it, he just kept saying to not worry about it because it was a good idea, even though it clearly wasn't. When I went out into the hall before I left, I called him and told him I didn't think it was a good idea, but I also didn't want to watch you get sad about the fact that the first person to really message you would have just disappeared. So I didn't agree with it, but I went along with it because I didn't want to hurt you any more. I was hoping that we were going to have service in Mons, but we didn't and I realized on the second day that that meant you weren't going to be receiving any messages. I figured you would leave it at 'oh he does a similar job to Mistah Steel, maybe he also had to go on a case out of town.' I didn't really think you would track my comms this quickly."   
  
Rita wouldn't look at him. "Why didn't you just tell me as soon as you realized what Mistah Peter had done?"   
  
"Because you were happy." She whipped her head around, glaring at him, which made him flinch but he still held her in a loose hug. "Because I saw how much happier you were with someone messaging you, and it felt wrong to ruin that so quickly. I knew you were going to find out, you're so smart when it comes to technology, and I underestimated you because you're even better than I thought you were." She looked away from him again. "Rita, when I said that you were sweet, and caring, and thoughtful, and smart, and empathetic, and all of the other things I said, I really meant them. I think you're absolutely wonderful and honestly, there are so many of my cases that I would never have solved if not for you, and I don't know what I would do without you. You really are more than just my secretary, you're truly one of my best friends, and I'm glad for that, I appreciate that fact. It would suck to have to go without you, and I wanted to make you feel like you really were as wonderful and amazing as I try to say you are. You just don't believe me when I say them, because you act like I'm incapable of any positive emotions, I'm just Mistah 'Always annoyed at everything' Steel. But I think you're amazing and that without you I'd be screwed, and figured there was a way to tell you that, so I should. I just didn't get there yet." Juno leaned into Rita a little more, resting his head on her shoulder. "I'm not trying to say that it's your fault. I'm just trying to say it's mine, but I didn't do it to try and hurt you. I was just trying to make you feel better."    
  
At this point Rita's sobbing returned, but this time she turned into Juno's shoulder and cried there, not because she forgave him, but simply because he was there.    
  
  
  
....That is, until she heard a ping from her phone. The same kind of ping that messages from Minter made, and she got angry, pushing at him. "Really? You're gonna do this to me now? What, is Mistah Peter signed in on his own comms so that you can both mock me?"    
  
Juno looked baffled, he had no idea what was going on. "Rita, no, I-" he pointed at where his comms was sitting on his desk. "My comms has been on my desk the whole time, Rita." She got up, glaring at him the whole time while she walked out to where she had left her own comms, on her desk. When she came back into Juno's office, he had a vaguely optimistic smile on his face. "Maybe someone else is messaging you this time?" he asked, hoping for the best, but also seeing the screen of his comms light up. He didn't have time for that right now, he was trying to make sure he wasn't about to deal with another break down.   
  
"You mean it? You're not playing any more mean games on me?"   
  
"Rita, I swear to you, I know nothing about whatever's on your screen right now."   
  
She broke out into a smile, sniffling a bit and wiping at her running makeup. "Well, that's good, because I just got a message from another very fake sounding name. Cosmos Gemstone. Do you think this one's real?"   
  
Juno gave her as sympathetic of a smile as he could. "I dont know, Rita. But I can tell you that it isn't me, so it's someone else for sure this time."   
  
She smiled back at him. "You're sure you meant all those things you said there boss?"   
  
"Every single word."   
  
She gave him a hug. "Does this mean I get a raise?"   
  
They both laughed. "We'll see. You go have fun messaging this Comos person."   
  
Juno sat back down at his desk and looked at his phone to see he had gotten a message from Peter.   
  
"You know, we talked about it, we said the dating app thing was fine, and I just enjoy talking to people, so I made one of my own. I thought the fake name went so well for you, so I decided to go the same route for my own profile. How do you like Cosmos Gemstone?"

**Author's Note:**

> You're all welcome, I'm an asshole.
> 
> Also, did ya'll know this was the 666th fic uploaded to the penumbra fandom on ao3? I consider this a personal accomplishment.
> 
> One person noticed so far, but the names of Pluto Silver and Cosmos Gemstone come from the Kaleidotrope podcast (because Joshua Ilon is a character who has a whole lot of names so I'm using a couple here). Also the case that the two of them go on to the Museum of Martian History is a reference to my fic "History Lessons" where the two of them didn't think about this at all because that fic was written before I had even planned this fic and aren't actually related but could be.
> 
> Also, I know characterization got a little wonky, but i mean, Juno goes *on* during his monologues, so that's my entire reasoning behind him having big blocks of text.
> 
> Kudos/Comment/Subscribe (to my user if you always wanna know when I'm posting) if you enjoyed (having your heart broken)! (Reminder that if you comment and I don't reply, I see it and I love you with my entire being and am probably screaming about getting comments off in a corner somewhere.)


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